Wherever You Are (I'll follow you)
by nabrumaleve
Summary: He couldn't stand that feeling. She was slipping away from him, in somewhere else he couldn't reach. (My contribution to our Caryl Fic war on Tumblr! Thanks Steph, for being an awesome Beta :] )


He woke with a start, like when you think you're falling from some high place and your body reacts in the real world.

He didn't even realize he slept at all. But he was used to it. To his body winning the war against his mind, and taking him down, like it was begging for some rest. The problem was, he couldn't seem to get his head to stop working. Thinking. _She was his mind all the time._

He felt like he lost her. He didn't know how to get to this place she was now stuck in, and the feeling of not knowing was killing him slowly. He realized something was wrong, that she was on the verge of breaking, and he had gotten so close to making her trust that he would gather the pieces when she was ready for it. He knew she would come to feel it. He wasn't stupid. Sooner or later, whatever was eating at her inside was going to catch up on her, and she would break. He would just make sure to be there with her when she went down that road, to show her that she wasn't on her own. That she was a part of them. _A part of him._

But he fucked up. He let himself be dragged again by his own demons, let them take him away from her. She found him, like she always did, and brought him back just by a touch of her lips. Her skin against his. That was enough to ground him again.

And that was when her own demons took her away from him, and he wasn't enough.

Nobody asked her what she felt when Beth was killed. Nobody reach out to her when Tyreese didn't make it back. She was the source of comfort not only for him, but to all of them. Still, nobody asked her.

And him? He was too late.

Daryl sighed, rubbing his eyes while getting up. Damn, he missed the prison. He missed being able to just walk around at night, listening to the sounds of everyone sleeping in their own cells. The feeling of looking at her sleeping form while passing by her door and not being able to help a smile at the memory of some teasing joke she said to him.

Everything was silence now. _This is a tomb_.

* * *

He found her in the kitchen, the moon light entering through the window while she was standing like a statue under it. For a moment, he was dumbstruck by her beauty. Her pale skin like milk, her hair glowing. Her body beneath nothing more than a big black shirt. _Was it his?_ He felt someting deep down on his belly, and his heart skipped a beat.

But that was before he saw her eyes. And the knife.

She was staring at it, almost in a awe. The blade shining in the moon light, her eyes reflecting it. Carol. Looking at the knife he found for her a long time ago, in another life. _Carol, lost in somewhere else he couldn't reach._

The fear that crept into him wasn't like the one he always felt in a close call. Where everything stopped and you saw your life running through you.

No, this one. This one made him cold. He was cold all over. Ice running through his veins.

Suddenly, she sighed, and looked at the window, her eyes were no longer glassed. She held the knife close to her body, and passed a hand through her hair, taking a deep breath. And he felt like he could breath again.

He turned and climbed the stairs the most silent he could, not wanting to reveal himself. He looked at the open door of her room for a moment, just across from his own, before closing his door behind him. He knew her. She couldn't give up. Just like all of them.

But it killed him that she wished she could.

He laid back in bed, staring at the ceiling, conjuring in his mind all the things he could say or do, that would make her realize he wasn't the selfish asshole that didn't care about her. That he was paying attention.

 _I'm here_

 _Whatever happened, we'll handle it_

 _You'll have to feel it_

 _You ain't gotta do everything on your own_

 _I'm here dammit_

 _We ain't ashes_

"Fuck"

He was an asshole. He wasn't any better than any of them. He could be out there, with her in that kitchen, telling her all of this. Or telling her nothing at all, but just being there. With her. _Wherever she was. He would follow._

But he wasn't. Instead, all he could do was not doing something about this sick feeling of seeing her sliping away from him

It was just that one part of him was _angry_ at her. Mad because he wasn't good enough to be something worthy. Because when she was at the kitchen, wishing she was just able to end everything, he wasn't enough for her not wanting it.

Angry because _she was sure_ he would never figure it out that it was his shirt she slept in since they arrived in Alexandria.


End file.
